One alternative is to seek another school where their love of teaching can be restored rather than leaving the profession entirely.

This is very much a decision that depends on the individual and the environment that he or she is working in. When a teacher’s love for their profession is gone, should they move on or try to find a way back? Nel Noddings has written about the importance of care, and if our students feel that we care for them, this can be a strong motivation for learning. Compassion allows us to see ourselves in the student, even the student who we find is hard to relate to. Compassion allows us to see our students as individuals who are struggling and sometimes suffering. Love brings patience and understanding, which are so important in teaching. Love sees teaching as an art where we explore different ways of connecting to subject matter and to students. One can teach basic skills without love, but to truly make a difference in a student’s life, there needs to be love. To be effective in the deepest sense, yes. They also wrote about how love and compassion require real strength and courage.ĭo teachers need to love teaching to be effective? When you look at their lives, they had tremendous impact on the world, which for me is evidence of the power of love. The work of Gandhi and King has had a strong influence on my writing as they saw love as the basis for living and social change. Love and beauty cannot be evaluated in the traditional manner, so educators shy away from them. Education reflects this with its focus on accountability and measurement. We live in a materialistic society that prizes consumerism and individual achievement.

Why don’t educators talk more about love or beauty? about compassion, seeing students as individuals, and why, at the age of 74, he still loves teaching. Miller, a professor at the University of Toronto, recently talked to Ed. And by love Miller doesn’t mean only romantic love, but self-love, love of beauty, compassion, and a love for learning. Love, he writes in his new book, is a powerful, motivating force for many teachers and students.

Very little has been written about how love impacts teaching and learning, which is why John Miller, M.A.T.'67, recently published Love and Compassion: Exploring Their Role in Education.

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